


Sin from your lips

by sunofthemoon



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: 5 Times, Angst and Porn, Dark Swan Arc (Once Upon a Time), F/F, Gratuitous Smut, POV Alternating, Season/Series 05, Swan Queen Advent Calendar 2020 (Once Upon a Time)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:20:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27700618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunofthemoon/pseuds/sunofthemoon
Summary: The Dark Swan can't control her magic. The only way to tame it is for another magic user to consume it—Regina volunteers far too quickly. After Emma jumped into a vortex of evil to save her, this is the least she can do.OrFive times Emma and Regina had sex in Camelot and blamed it on magic.Written for Swan Queen Advent Calendar ii: 2020 ed.
Relationships: Evil Queen | Regina Mills/Emma Swan
Comments: 32
Kudos: 257
Collections: Swan Queen Advent Calendar Collection 2





	Sin from your lips

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Angeii_K](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angeii_K/gifts).



> What even is this I can't say. What started as a thirst trap wrote itself into this. It's all Ang's fault.
> 
> Warnings:  
> — **This fic is NSFW!**  
>  — Robin and Hook are mentioned in this fic. Hook very briefly, and Robin makes a small appearance. 
> 
> Happy holidays! I hope everyone has a splendid day <3

**One: Need.**

“No,” she whimpers, soft and fragile. It’s a plea unheard, buried underneath the shivers of someone too hot to be so cold. “Please.”

A whisper of a laugh touches her skin, laps at the sweat that has gathered there. “I’ll leave.” It’s a promise, one belonging to green eyes and a shock of blonde hair. The face of her saviour, and her biggest enemy.

“Emma, please.” She reaches out, grasps Emma’s hand between her cold fingers to stop her from doing something stupid. This thing they do, where they pretend to be less than they are doesn’t have any room to grow here. They’re suffocated enough already, choking from all the lies they tell each other.

Emma pauses, her shoulders tensing. Her hair is loose, a tangled mess of curls that hasn’t seen a brush in days. She’s been like this for too long, left to the mercy of her own mind as they all focus their energy on saving a man who might aid them. A wizard trapped in a tree. “Will you help, then?” Emma asks, raspy and desperate. “Regina? Will you help—”

“Yes.” Because Regina is the opposite of Emma, the other side of the coin. They are never meant to touch, only co-exist, yet here Regina sits, too eager for any of this to make sense. She stands from the bed, Emma’s hand still in hers where it glows with unrestrained magic. It’s been like this for two days now, an entity the saviour can no longer contain on her own.

And perhaps, the only reason Regina is here, trying to save her enemy from a curse, is because Emma had sacrificed everything for her. They didn’t agree to surrender things for each other; that was beyond the boundaries of their relationship. They have no rules now—not as opposites, not as co-parents, not as rivals—all they have is each other, and the vast space between them where everything unsaid resides.

The only solution, however temporary, is to consume Emma’s magic. No one else can survive it—her sister, Zelena, doesn’t count. Not for this. This is Regina’s burden to carry, her payment when she rests her palm on Emma’s face and feels warmth. Everything that will happen, might bring them to their knees.

“Are you sure?” Regina asks, because there is no going back.

Stepping closer, until Regina can hear her uneven breaths and see her chest rise and fall with the action, Emma nods her agreement. “I won’t ask again. I will not _beg_.”

They have always had pride in common, a sinful thing to possess at a time like this. Not when there is so much _need_. Enough that Regina can drown in it if she leans in a little, has a taste of the magic that wanted her first. She rocks forward toward it on instinct, her fingers slipping over Emma’s ear up into her hair. Regina doesn’t hesitate to grab a fistful, to pull Emma’s head back and expose her neck.

“You can’t kill me,” Emma reminds her, breathing hard. She makes no effort to straighten herself, to stop Regina from pulling her close. 

In a different time; without a dark curse and sacrifices urging them on, Regina might’ve taken her time. But magic is a potent thing, seeped in the seven sins that Regina has already been intimate with. She chuckles darkly at the comment, tugging harder on Emma’s hair to make her stop. She says, “I want you,” like it might mean more than consuming magic and saving a life. Weightier than a curse and the shared love they have for their son. “Do you consent to this?”

Emma laughs through her nose, a maniacal sound that comes from deep within her. Regina allows her the time to think this through, beyond magic and desperation. When she finally gathers herself, Emma leans into Regina as much as she can, her eyes dark with arousal. “Then take me,” she challenges.

It’s all Regina needs. Lust for magic fills her pores, makes her feel powerful and wanted. Had she been dressed in jewelled corsets and leather tights, Regina might’ve thought herself a queen again; but she stands here in a velvet red dress, her hair shorter than is appropriate for a monarch—and when she surges forward, Regina doesn’t kiss. She _licks_ , tastes the magic sitting on Emma’s neck.

Bitterness fills her mouth, like tequila without salt or lime; a death with promised intoxication that Regina moans for. 

“What does it taste like?” Emma asks, her voice a vibration against Regina’s lips. They owe nothing to each other, no questions nor answers, and Regina embraces silence when she grasps Emma by the hips to pull her closer, warm and soft against each other. 

She’s drunk, addicted to the magic that gathers on her tongue. There is no limit to where Regina can go, yet she keeps Emma in a hold, sucking on her pulse point like it might tell her the secrets of the world. There’s no doubt that she’ll leave a mark, that everyone will look at the new Dark One with curious eyes and wonder who was stupid enough to kiss her.

Regina doesn’t care. She doesn’t care that Emma moans low and deep, that Regina’s dress is held in fistfuls to be used as an anchor as Emma grinds her hips up, desperate for fiction. Maybe the magic makes her do it, maybe it’s her own attraction to the woman from so many years ago that makes her slip her thigh between Emma’s legs, uses her grip on Emma’s hips to steady her against the limb.

Emma is warm against her. Warm, _hot_ , and increasingly wetter the longer she ruts. Soft moans fills the room, breathy gasps that Regina takes as permission to move higher, up over the edge of Emma’s jaw, her lips ghosting over the smoothness of her cheek, and finally, to place a soft kiss at the corner of her mouth before Emma shudders against her.

Beneath the burning taste of the curse, Regina feels Emma’s light magic, can smell the lavender and cinnamon, feel the brightness of the woman everyone believed in before. With no more magic escaping Emma’s fingers, there’s no need for them to still hold onto each other, to pretend that this means more than it actually is.

“Thank you,” Emma rasps. A transaction, business as usual when Emma pulls away and rights herself. Regina doesn’t comment on the fact that Emma can’t look at her in the eyes, or that the hickey on her neck seems to be fading just as quickly as the warmth on Regina’s dress.

She says, “Anytime,” in a voice so rough, that it doesn’t hide how aroused Regina still is. Emma doesn’t notice however, doesn’t look up even as Regina exits the room that smells like sweat and magic, leaving behind a darkness she never thought could taste so good.

* * *

**Two: Jealousy.**

Henry comes to them about a girl who is pretty and clever, who likes horses and smiles at him like he might be special. Emma remembers what that felt like—to have someone see you as more than what you might be. She tells him about Neal, abut the few months when he was good and everything she needed.

Regina gushes about Daniel, about his kindness and boyish charm. A part of her burns with jealousy, with a rage that comes from places unearthed by this curse. Regina keeps talking, encouraging their son to pursue his crush. And Emma pays attention to their interaction, thinks _mine_ with possession that startles her.

“You okay?” Regina asks, her hand on Emma’s arm.

Henry is gone, and all that remains is them, framed by swaying trees that block the view of the castle from here. “I’m fine,” she lies. Because that’s what she’s good at now, what the Dark Ones have taught her to do when it comes to Regina. The last time she had complained about her magic, Emma had been left drained for days, a magical husk that wandered Camelot like her old self—the one without parents or a son or an enemy who gave her an orgasm. 

What she’d give to feel like that again.

Already, her magic spills from her, snags on things with the tempting song to use it. How easy it would be to reach out and strangle someone who wronged her, or to send her parents into a spiral that would make them feel the abandonment they inflicted upon her as a child. It would make everything right again; it would balance the things that pull The Saviour and Dark One in two different directions.

Emma closes her eyes against the image of Regina, sees the aura of her magic dancing with reds and oranges. “How did you do it?” she asks in a whisper, and Regina stiffens beside her, already knowing what she means.

“I thought whatever I did was justified,” Regina answers simply. Guided by the hand, Emma follows the person her darkness wants to devour, the person it wanted first. Regina chuckles low as they ascend the stairs into the castle’s courtyard, moving quickly as if by magic that trails behind them. She continues, “You’re a good person, and we’re going to fix this.”

Something about being fixed makes Emma snap. She doesn’t need to be put together, and Regina should know as much by now.

Shoving Regina against the stone wall, Emma growls menacingly. “I am not _good_ ,” she hisses. Her magic is wild, a vibrant display that engulfs them both in a shade of grey, hides them from eyes in the castle that disappear behind an illusion. 

Regina’s eyes narrow, her breathing shallows out, and her chin lifts in defiance. The darkness thinks she’s beautiful like this, so exposed and eager to please. A part of Emma shrivels up and dies, the part of her that wants Regina to remain her friend, the one who knows that after all of this, there might be nothing left of them.

“I won’t beg,” Regina says. A mocking use of Emma’s statement when they did this last. 

Regina’s lips pout, anticipating the taste of magic that Emma might give her. And it would be logical to lean into this, to give some of her magic away so she can think again. But Emma hesitates, her gaze casting around the courtyard that’s open for any of this despite the lack of people around.

“Not here,” she says, breathing hard against the edge of Regina’s jaw. 

There is nowhere else to go, and Regina doesn’t listen when her fingers dig into Emma’s hips to pull her close. “If I take us away from here, what difference will it make?”

“All the difference.” This time, Emma begs, and Regina complies without any fuss.

A stack of hay cushions their fall, and the smell of horses lingers in the air. The stables, this is where Regina brings her. It’s personal and delicate, telling of too many things that Regina told Henry before of a boy with a kind smile.

“I’m insulted,” Emma can’t help but say.

Regina laughs, her lips skirting along the edge of Emma’s ear. “This is what you get.” 

A rough something, a fantasy fulfilled. This is what Regina thinks she’s insulted by, not the comparison to a lover lost to darkness just like Emma. For once, without her need to rectify and self-sabotage, Emma remains silent on matter. The only thing she does is spread her legs against Regina’s hand that travels slowly up her thigh.

“Is this what you want?” Regina asks. Soft, tentative. Like a woman who has been on the receiving end of attentions she did not want.

Laying back into the haystack, Emma closes her eyes as she snickers. “A roll in the hay,” she murmurs, “I’d be a fool to say no.”

That earns her a pinch to her hip, but Emma giggles like a teenager taking off her panties in the back of the car, eager and nervous, and besotted. She tries not to dwell on that last feeling, not to enamour herself with the image of Regina who leans over her like a goddess. “Please,” Emma whispers at last, unable to wait any longer as she leans up for a kiss that’s denied.

“No,” Regina tells her, “not that.” 

And for what it’s worth, Emma understands. This is a need that only another magic user can satisfy, and Regina knows what’s expected of her when she leans down to kiss along Emma’s neck, to suck the magic from her skin and reach under skirts that have no need to be touched.

The horse in the next stall snorts in annoyance when Emma moans. It’s a low sound that rumbles in her chest, a hum of gratitude as Regina finally presses her palm where she needs it most. It doesn’t take long for Emma to start grinding down, to beg without words until Regina grunts and plunges two fingers into Emma.

A gasp, a moment to adjust. Regina stops kissing her skin, and the magic floods her system again, pulsing through her body where it makes its way down to Regina’s fingers still inside her. “No, no. You can’t.”

“Can’t what?” Regina asks innocently. Her eyes are dark, pigmented with flecks of grey that look like the storm of Emma’s magic. A peek of the Evil Queen, of a woman who would be more lover than friend.

Reaching down to grasp at Regina’s wrist, Emma realises that this isn’t going to come easy. There’s a smirk on Regina’s face, and Emma’s desperation grows with each passing minute as she’s left to the mercy of her magic that builds in her lower abdomen, hot and heavy and driving her wild.

It takes all her strength to push Regina back. And the surprised expression on her friend’s face would have been something to laugh at, but it isn’t on Emma’s agenda. Not when she straddles Regina again, guides slim fingers back inside her with a hiss. 

“Emma,” Regina warns, her eyes shifting back to it’s usual brown. “You don’t need this.”

“Then stop. Tell me to stop.”

Because consent is important, they’ve established that. And Emma can bundle herself up and forget this ever happened, but Regina looks at her with longing and a lust for the magic that thrums through Emma’s veins.

Sliding into her more firmly, Regina holds Emma by her hip and pulls her slightly forward. “Don’t stop,” she says breathily.

Whatever it might mean, whatever things remain unsaid between them don’t come out in the open. It stays hidden in the way Emma rolls her hips into Regina’s fingers, in the soft moans that tumble from her lips.

She’s wild and desperate, bucking against the goodwill of her friend who demands not to be kissed. Emma feels herself building toward a crescendo, can see the way Regina’s shallow breaths match her short, quick thrusts. The haze of magic makes her weak, pushes her down to press her forehead against Regina’s as everything rises sharply, then drops into harsh gasp.

Regina’s fingers slip out from her, and the moment tears into pieces as the last of the magic is consumed.

“Better?” Regina asks in a voice so raw, that Emma shudders at the sound of it.

This is the end of their need, and it takes everything from Emma to pull herself off from Regina, to right her dress and stand there like the woman siting on a haystack doesn’t mean more to her. 

“Yes. Thank you,” she replies, and makes her way out of the stables like nothing ever happened there.

* * *

**Three: Surrender**

She doesn’t see Emma for days afterward. Merlin’s tower is absent of Emma’s presence, and Regina grows anxious as she fails to find a solution to all of this.

Henry has been keeping her company in the evenings, chattering on about the girl who promised to teach him how to groom the horses. He asks her if she’d like to come, but Regina’s hands tremble too much when she turns the page of another book and her tired smile is enough of an answer for him.

When he leaves, Robin takes his place. She hasn’t allowed him to touch her since she first consumed the magic from Emma. Something about her body feels sacred now, belonging to a force bigger than her supposed soulmate. Her chest aches whenever she looks at him, feels sorry for what she’s done even if they’ve agreed to this before it started.

Tonight, Robin walks toward her with his hands in his pockets, his head tilted to the side with a smile that can mean only one thing. “Not tonight,” she tells him quickly. The sound of a book closing startles him, makes him step back with understanding.

“Then when?”

Another book is taken, flipped open callously to a random page that tears at the edge. “Robin, please.”

He takes her trembling hand, holds it within his own as he traces the lines in her palm. He’s always been good at calming her, for being a solid presence when she feels as if she’s drowning. “I will always be your friend,” he says softly, his fingertip running down her love-line that forks at the end. “You don’t always have to choose what pixie dust wants for you.” He smiles at her as his fingers smooth over her palm, wiping away his presence with a single action.

Releasing her hand, Robin steps back with a shrug. “I’m sorry,” she rasps, his figure blurry beneath a sheen of tears.

Robin opens his arms for a hug, and this, Regina decides, she can give him.

…

The room they once shared belongs solely to Regina now. Roland’s things are gone along with Robin’s, and the only thing that remains is the faint smell of them that dulls the longer Regina stands there.

It feels strange to know that Zelena has taken the news with a pinch of salt, that she’d looked at Regina with wide eyes and swallowed thickly to rid herself of hope. In all the crimes she had committed, Zelena’s biggest punishment was falling in love. Everything that comes thereafter will be dependant on Robin, and he’s changed so much that Regina doesn’t know what to expect.

“It’s useless.”

Regina turns sharply at the sound. “Emma?” she asks, because the woman standing before her looks drained of colour, of the fight that made her so recognisable before.

Emma staggers into her room with the stench of magic, and it rids the place of any evidence of Robin and Roland. Regina automatically draws closer, can already taste it on her lips. 

“We can’t fix it,” Emma rasps, grasping onto the edge of Regina’s bed. “It will always be like this.”

She dares not edge closer, not unless whatever control she manages to contain escapes her grasp. It leaves her wanting, makes her think that whatever Emma is saying might not be so bad. Regina can take the darkness, will allow it to seep into her pores and trap it there. But Emma looks devastated at the thought, and it makes Regina pause.

Kneeling in front of Emma, she tentatively reaches for Emma’s hand. It’s so pale and cold, like a block of ice that Regina refuses to let go of. “I can make it better,” she says in a whisper, like a secret they haven’t kept that well.

Emma closes her eyes tightly, turns her head away as she nods. Regina doesn’t move however, doesn’t take a forced yes as consent, not when Emma’s chin wobbles and she looks too overwhelmed.

“Please,” comes the plea after a long time, when Emma’s mask of indifference is broken, and her free hand slides over Regina’s cheek. “I can’t take it anymore.”

She can force her way between Emma’s legs, claim that they need this for anything to work. Regina knows she’s selfish enough to want this much, but she will never hurt her friend for the sake of a desire that so easily controlled. Instead, Regina turns her head to press a kiss to Emma’s wrist, to take a little magic that leaves a bitter taste on her lips.

It works enough that Emma’s gaze is focused again, that her breathing becomes even, and her scattered thoughts seem to sharpen when she presses her thumb against Regina’s mouth.

For this, Regina doesn’t resist. The magic is stronger like this, where her tongue licks at the taste of darkness and sucks the magic out. Emma groans from above her, and Regina releases the thumb when it has nothing left to give. She’s desperate, knowing there’s more in other places, and hungry for whatever Emma will give.

Adjusting herself on her knees, she hisses when Emma pulls her forward, turns her head away before those lips can meet hers in a kiss that she’s too fragile to see the outcome of. “Boundaries,” she growls, and Emma kisses her jaw instead.

This isn’t about her pleasure. The only thing Regina is allowed is the magic that Emma expels, and to break that agreement now would be to hurt too many people. She might not be with Robin anymore, but there’s still Hook to consider.

Shoving Emma back from her, Regina reaches under Emma’s white dress to find her legs. “Tell me when to stop.”

Emma’s hands fist into the duvet on either side of her, but she doesn’t offer anything to Regina. All she does is look down, hurt at being denied a kiss Regina has explicitly refuted before. Emma says, “I want it,” and leans down to threaten Regina with a kiss again.

She listens, however, and doesn’t go any further as Regina’s hands travel up Emma’s legs to slowly spread them apart. Once she reaches Emma’s knees, the dress bunched up around Emma’s thighs and out of her way, Regina presses forward as Emma leans back to accommodate her. “You know I can’t give you _that_.” And she won’t, even if she drags Emma’s underwear down and tosses it somewhere across the room.

The dress is pushed up further, a creased bundle that sits over Emma’s hips to display everything to Regina. Emma might be the Dark One, but they both know who has power here. An answering moan from Emma is enough confirmation as Regina kisses her neck, her hand already between Emma’s legs to tease her into submission. “Relax,” Regina breathes. And Emma only complies when Regina lowers herself down again, her tongue swiping a firm line across Emma’s centre.

Emma jerks, and Regina only barely keeps her down. She tastes like sin, and all the whispered secrets of temptation. It doesn’t take long for Regina to bury herself between Emma’s legs, to hold her steady as Emma writhes above her, shouting into an empty room for any God to help her.

Regina is relentless, and she cares not for the hand in her hair that pulls her tighter against Emma. She licks where she thinks the most magic is, sucks on Emma’s clit that makes her taste power, and plunges into the depths of darkness that has Emma scream with such force that it shatters the nearby mirror.

Her fingernails dig into Emma’s hip, keeping her pinned as Regina demands another orgasm, makes the magic come alive with her mouth that isn’t satisfied yet.

It pulses against her, sweeps out in waves until Regina gasps alongside Emma, until her skin glows with magic and the darkness settles in her bones as if its always belonged there. Maybe a minute passes, maybe more, and then all that’s left is emptiness as the muffled cries of Emma’s pleasure subsides.

“Emma?” Regina calls softly. She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and ignores her trembling muscles as she climbs up onto the bed.

Emma has her eyes covered with her arm, a sheen of sweat making her skin glisten where her dress doesn’t cover. There’s colour where it should be, and Regina notices that her dress isn’t white anymore, it’s a pale yellow that Snow probably chose. 

This is the part where Emma will thank her and leave. But when Regina lays down beside her and tugs the dress down to preserve her modesty, Emma doesn’t complain. The only thing Emma does is turn into Regina’s chest and accept the embrace that’s offered.

For the first time in her life, Regina sees the Dark One fall asleep.

* * *

**Four: Want**

Merlin is freed from the tree, and Henry pays the price for it.

This isn’t what she wanted, but Emma is coming to learn that no matter how small the magic is, that there is always a consequence. Henry’s heartbreak over Violet’s admission of not being interested in him romantically is proof of that, and Emma won’t dare to think about how her magic only calms down once Regina has touched her.

Sacrifice in whatever form it chooses to take is still as dangerous as magic itself. No matter if it’s a soul for a woman or a tear for a tree. 

“I will end her,” Regina hisses. And Emma holds back a smirk as she watches Regina pace, protective of her son despite their victory.

Reaching out, Emma stills her by grasping her wrist. “These things happen,” she reassures Regina, intertwining their fingers together like they’re lovers instead of co-parents. “All we can do is support Henry and know that there is someone better out there for him.”

“Someone better?” Regina scoffs, “Of course, there is. But how dare _that_ _girl_ reject my son.”

“Our son.”

Regina looks up at her, her eyes glowing purple. She’s so angry, so beautiful like this. “Our son,” Regina corrects, but her lips are twisted in a sneer, and Emma’s darkness can taste the magic radiating from her.

How badly she wants to press her lips to the column of Regina’s neck, to take what Regina has been taking from her all along. She says, “You can’t do anything foolish. Henry would never forgive you.” And Regina pulses with magic, allows it to ooze from her like venom. It flows through their joined hands and Emma gasps at the feel of pure sin on her skin.

Ripping her hand away, Regina takes a step back. “I’m sorry.” 

The magic subsides, but the damage is already done. They’re standing in the middle of Granny’s diner with the remnants of Henry’s failed date their only company, and Emma aches for Regina, wants to consume her in a way she never has. 

Maybe it’s because Merlin is free that she wants to delve into her darkness one last time, to blame her desires on the whispers in her head and the magic on her fingertips. Maybe Regina feels it too, maybe she wants Emma’s power just as much as Emma wants hers.

They stand opposite each other, waiting. Asking. 

“What would your magic taste like?” Emma breathes, and Regina gasps at the raw desire in her voice.

Stepping toward her, Emma skims her fingers over Regina’s cheek, feels the spark of dark magic low in her belly. “Emma, we had a deal,” Regina reminds her.

Only Regina can consume, and only when it becomes too much for Emma. But what about now? What about when Emma is hungry, when she can barely think about anything else other than Regina’s skin and her quiet voice telling her to sleep? That had been weeks ago, weeks of agonising over everything, of falling into Hook and yelling at him when he failed to do what Regina did.

He was not the one she sacrificed for. He will never be the one who can balance her magic, who can bring her to her knees with only whispered words asking for surety. This is what she told him all those weeks ago, and he had laughed like he knew all along. When he left, the last thing he told her was to be happy. This is what she intends to do now.

“I want you,” she tells Regina.

Emma expects a refusal, but Regina isn’t blind, and the lack of Hook’s presence is telling enough. “And what then?” she asks instead.

Smiling, Emma presses against Regina, their foreheads resting against each other. “We figure it out together, whenever you’re ready.”

Their lips are achingly close, but Emma stops herself from claiming a kiss. There are still rules in place, and the only thing she can afford to do is wait for Regina’s consent.

They push and pull, and Emma can see how Regina struggles to contain her magic that is as much Emma’s as it is hers. “You can’t make it better,” Regina tells her softly. “This I can manage on my own.”

Emma walks them backwards until Regina’s thighs hit the end of one of the booths, stopping them in their tracks. She reaches back to steady herself on the table, halting Emma’s progress. “You don’t have to,” Emma promises, her breathing shallow and uneven, her hands hovering over Regina’s body where it wants to touch so badly. 

Like a flickering bulb, the purple in Regina’s eyes flitter in and out, struggling against her desires. Emma doesn’t fight hers anymore, and the reflection of it shines in Regina’s eyes with specks of grey. 

Tenderly running the backs of her knuckles down Emma’s cheek, Regina guides her to lay down on the leather seat. Emma complies if only because she’s curious, and the image of Regina crawling toward her leaves her breathless. 

Wordlessly, Regina slides her hand up Emma’s dress, unbothered to bunch it up like times previous. They do not kiss, Regina does not taste her, but her fingers find what they need and enter Emma without resistance, claim her like she’s been there a thousand times.

They move slowly, magic flowing between them as Regina settles her weight on Emma like an anchor. “Is this what you wanted?” she asks.

“No,” Emma answers through a moan. Regina frowns at the answer, her fingers stilling like she’s committed a crime. “I want _you_ ,” Emma clarifies, “let me taste you.”

Emma knows she’s begging, but she doesn’t care. Regina smiles at her, wide and forgiving. “Not today,” she answers, and slides down to where her fingers are buried, her tongue joining in to make Emma moan.

Warmth encases her, settles into her skin as she arches her back and grabs Regina’s free hand to steady herself. She has no extra magic to give, but Regina takes what she has to spare, leaving her empty and impossibly human. “Please,” Emma begs when her magic struggles, when it feels like the curse might break out of fright.

Her hips keep grinding down against Regina’s face, and her thighs clench around her head. When she shatters, when there is no magic left and she’s hollow, that is when Regina stops.

Emma lies there on the seat, her thighs sticky with her bliss, and all she does is breathe. 

“I want you too,” Regina breathes into her ear, sounding just as desperate. Something moves against Emma’s thigh with purpose, and Emma gasps when she realises Regina is pleasuring herself. Scrambling to sit up, Emma sets Regina on her lap in a more comfortable position and doesn’t dare touch.

Regina’s chest heaves, her skin glows with a light sheen of sweat, and she rolls her hips into her hand without any shame. It’s like watching a dance, slow and sensual, and left entirely to the imagination. How is it that every time they do this, they’re fully clothed?

Groaning, Emma reaches for the ties at the back of Regina’s dress. “Just a little,” she begs, “just a small taste.” Because Emma’s magic is subdued, but Regina’s is fiery and wild, and demanding attention. When Regina nods, Emma thinks this might be a dream.

Slowly, in tandem with Regina’s movements, Emma slides the dress down over her shoulders, follows its path over the top of her breasts with her eyes. “Enough,” Regina reprimands, and it’s torture.

Holding her steady, Emma lets her lips slide over Regina’s skin, feels the burn of electricity as she teases the magic before reaching the boundary of Regina’s dress. She’s not given permission to move further, and there isn’t time to ask when Regina’s movements become jerky and uncoordinated. Ten seconds, counting down in her head, and Emma licks the skin along Regina’s chest up to her neck where she tastes pure sin.

Spice, anger, resentment, heat. They burn on Emma’s tongue hot enough to make her moan with Regina as she comes, shuddering into Emma’s lap as her excess magic is transferred to the dark one who can’t get enough. Emma demands just like Regina did, kisses along Regina’s neck and scratches down her back to pull her closer.

Magic, the feel of it, the taste of it. Nothing compares.

A hand to her throat is the only thing that makes her stop. Pushed back with force, Emma sucks in a ragged breath as Regina presses against her, her thumb skimming over Emma’s lips with need. “Another time,” Regina promises, but she doesn’t seal it with a kiss.

* * *

**Five: Possession.**

They can’t touch each other anymore. Not until Merlin has pulled the darkness from Emma. Something about needing all her magic to control a spark—and Regina hasn’t been paying much attention to anything other than Emma lately.

Emma who wants her, who asks for her magic and isn’t sorry for it. 

Maybe she’s been a little on edge since Hook left, wondering what his absence means next to Emma’s newfound desires. Everyone has been keeping her busy recently, pulling her here and there to organise and maintain whilst they flutter about Emma with equal measure. There has been no time to question Emma, not unless fleeting glances and scorching gazes count.

They decide the day Merlin is to remove the darkness, and the night before is left for them all to pack. Her room is emptied of her belongings, the dresses she wore is hung up in the closet and left for whoever might need it next, and the task of consuming Emma’s magic is removed from her shoulders as soon as she exits the castle.

The night is cool, and her heels dig into the grass as she tracks her way through the path to Granny’s. She can see the lights in the window, people laughing as they hold up drinks and set out plates of food. They’re all back in their old clothes, and Regina feels far more comfortable in her pantsuit where she adorns the personality of Madame Mayor, and leaves behind the Regina who feels for the Dark One.

“Aren’t you going in?” 

“You’re out here,” Regina comments. “Why am I not surprised?”

Emma shrugs her shoulders, her leather jacket squeaking with the action. This is the Saviour, the woman who wears denim and has no need for etiquette. A diamond in the rough that Regina is so fond of. “It will all be over tomorrow. I’ll be back to normal.”

There’s a tinge of anger in her voice, accompanied with a pulse of magic that doesn’t hide itself well enough.

Regina says, “It doesn’t have to be,” like a devil sitting on Emma’s shoulder. “You can choose who you want to be.”

A hand slides over her own, and Regina allows Emma the brief touch before she pulls back. There is no magic she can take, nothing she can use as an excuse as to why she wants Emma so much. To have someone sacrifice everything for you, Regina has never known another love so pure.

“What do you want, Emma? ” she asks.

Her view of the diner is blocked, and the light from Granny’s outlines Emma’s figure as she stands there, unsure of herself. “You can’t take my magic,” she says softly, “but I can take a bit of yours.”

The anticipation, the culmination of this game they are playing comes to a standstill. There is no other opportunity for this, no more dark magic to exchange once Merlin has done his job. She steps in close, lowers her voice to a whisper. “Then take it.”

A dare whispered sweetly between them. But no one moves, no one takes that extra step as the sounds of the celebration reach them. All of them are waiting for their saviour—the old and new, but Regina and Emma stand here, facing each other with too much want between them.

“Hey, Emma!” Someone calls, and the image of Granny’s disappears as Emma grasps her arm, takes her away by the will of her magic.

Merlin’s tower is absent of life, only the ghosts of the last few weeks haunt them as Emma presses her against the nearest wall. Regina searches Emma’s face, and finds pain, a world of hurt that doesn’t come from the curse of darkness. Neither of them trembles with magic, none of them are needy enough for this.

Her blazer slides off her shoulders, falls to the floor with a thud. Emma follows her willingly, steps backward until she stumbles down onto a chair. “Coward,” Regina taunts.

The bait isn’t taken, not like this, not when Regina slowly unbuttons her shirt and tugs it out of her pants. She’s more exposed than she’s ever been with Emma, her skin within reach and her magic dancing across her fingers. Candles flicker to light, casting them in a dim orange glow, and its then that Regina sees the pure lust in Emma’s eyes.

No, not a coward. But perhaps, Emma is more comfortable like this, with Regina taking the lead.

She pulls her shirt off and sets it on the nearest table, adds her belt to the collection as she slowly unzips her pants and allows it to slide down her legs. Naked save for her underwear, Regina settles herself on Emma’s lap, open and inviting to a woman who gapes at her.

“Go on, then.”

Emma’s touch feels like water. Delicate, gentle fingers that travel down her back in a cool caress. Regina holds back a whimper, tries not to squirm when Emma reaches the dip of her spine and stops there. Regina feels heat on her shoulder, feels the temperature of Emma’s lust as she rests her cheek against bare skin and takes a staggering breath.

They pause, caught in a bubble of intimacy that was never allowed with magic in the way. Regina cannot deny the want that stems from their history, from the connection they have to each other that put this curse in Emma in the first place. She says, “You are an idiot.”

A short laugh is pressed against her shoulder, lips and teeth sliding along her skin. Regina slips her fingers through Emma’s hair, feels the silky strands run across her palm as the comfort each other.

“What did I do now?”

The question comes with humour. Regina tugs Emma back with her hair, meets her gaze with an intensity that wipes Emma’s smile from her face. “Jump into a vortex of evil. Who _does_ that?”

Emma’s gentle caress becomes rough. She squeezes Regina’s hip and her eyes become stormy with magic that isn’t her own. Anger, like a putrid smelling thing, seeps from Emma’s pores. “A saviour,” she answers easily. But her jaw is wrought with tension, and the tendons in her neck stand out with beating rage. 

Regina skims her fingers over Emma’s face. “Why did you really do it?”

She sees Emma shut down. Walls build and gates close, and Regina feels stupid for sitting on Emma’s lap with only her underwear and self-righteousness. She isn’t shoved off however, isn’t handled with disregard.

It takes a minute; maybe more, long enough for Regina to watch the rise and fall of Emma’s chest. To count every heavy breath and feel those fingers loosen from around her hip. When Regina picks her gaze up to Emma, she sees all the things that have been swept under the carpet and hidden away for another time.

“Why won’t you kiss me?” Emma asks.

Fear bares itself to Emma before Regina can stop it from flushing across her chest. “We agreed,” she rasps, trying too hard to sound level-headed. “We had people we were with. You have Hook—”

“He’s gone,” Emma says sharply. “I told him to go.”

“You _told_ him to go?”

Emma laughs. A sound so dizzying that Regina rocks toward it as if in a trance. “Do you think you are the only one who can send away soulmates?” Pulled forward, Regina finds herself flush against Emma, staring down the barrel of a woman who has come to take comfort in her darkness. “I can make choices too.”

_Choices_. Is that all this has been? Regina can’t think beyond Emma’s hands that have started to roam again, to her lips that skim over her skin, and her burning gaze that makes Regina fit too many pieces together. She says, “You should have said something sooner,” like they might’ve been able to set aside their pride and priorities to get this. To be in each other’s arms. To forsake roles and responsibilities, find a hovel in a faraway kingdom and touch each other with reverence.

Emma doesn’t answer her in words. She hovers over places she wants to explore and waits for Regina’s nod. Once permission is given, all Regina sees is red. Hot, wild, unyielding. All she hears is the sound of her heavy breathing, feels warmth on her chest where Emma finds herself a home, and the brush of fingers that travel around her inner thigh and settle there, massaging, stroking, begging.

Regina wonders if this is how Emma felt during their trysts. If being vulnerable to judgement had made her shy, made her duck her head as pleasure flushed across her cheeks, made her wild with something that kept building and building until it was unrecognisable. A structure made of lust, a bizarre thing that settles in her lower back and makes her needy enough to grasp Emma’s hand, to slide her palm up until Emma cups her through her underwear and groans around her nipple.

There is no excuse for this. No arrangement.

No name to give this thing that Regina gasps for, rolls her hips into, and tugs on Emma’s neck to bring her up, up, up.

Sweat shines along her skin, the dampness between her legs drawn out by Emma’s fingers that seem to be unbothered by the state of her jeans. Regina feels shame, a small prickling thing, but Emma sucks on her pulse point and thumbs her clit and Regina whines as the chair groans beneath them. It rocks with every jerk of Regina’s hips, threatens to take them tumbling down when she adjusts herself to press further into Emma. All Emma does is laugh against her throat, hold her tighter and kiss her skin harder.

“That’s it,” she hears. Soft, like a summer breeze. 

The edge is near but Regina struggles for it. Her skin feels too sensitive to Emma’s clothes. She worries after the chair that doesn’t stay put.

“Come now,” is whispered into her ear. “You’re almost there.” A kiss is pressed to her cheek, to her jaw. Quiet little things, no fuss to them as they coax Regina out of her head and back into her body. 

She can feel the trembling of her thighs, the burn of her muscles as she stretches her legs over Emma’s lap, the places Emma has kissed that begin to heat up again. “Please,” she begs. Pleads with her eyes closed as she arches her back, sounding far too much like Emma.

Blood rushes to her head, pounds in her ears as her body freezes. Emma kisses the corner of her mouth, longing and yearning for something Regina won’t give. But tomorrow Emma will be rid of her magic, saved by Merlin’s hand. And what has she got to lose?

Regina trembles with her orgasm just as she turns her face to Emma, feels lips against her own that doesn’t kiss gently. They come together like a storm, ravage each other in panting breaths and the nip of teeth, taste each other with imploring tongues that are never hesitant. Regina matches Emma’s feverish pace, feels herself claimed by a kiss that has no sense of calm.

Magic explodes around them, sinking into Regina’s pores as she moans against Emma. She tastes different, sweeter somehow. A new thing to explore.

“I want you,” Emma breathes between kisses. “Let me have you.”

Turning her head away, Regina catches her breath as she tries to organise her thoughts. “Still?” she asks in a whisper, like a maiden who doesn’t sit on her lover’s lap with her underwear askew, and fingers still twitching inside her.

When Regina is met with silence, she fears for what she might’ve done. But Emma slowly slips out of her, sticky fingers wet against her thigh. She says, “Always,” like they haven’t broken an impossible curse, like they don’t sit in an abandoned tower on a rickety chair they made love on.

A slow smile spreads across Regina’s face, hesitant and careful. “Then take me,” she purrs, and is kissed again, with a tenderness that promises far more than they thought they deserved.

  
  



End file.
